In 1927 a man named Les Clark began to work for
Disney animating the in-between drawings for Oswald the Lucky Rabbit
cartoons and then Mickey Mouse cartoons. As time would go on, he
became the longest continuously employed member of Walt Disney
Productions while animating classic characters like Pinocchio, Dumbo,
and Roger from One Hundred and One Dalmatians. He eventually went on
to direct the short Paul Bunyan while also working as a
directing animator on characters like Cinderella, Lady, and Peter
Pan.

As time would go on, eight other animators joined
the Disney company and helped lead the company to the high standard
of excellence in full length Disney animated films that we all know
and love to this very day. In the 1930s, Walt Disney was speaking
about his group of core animators and referred to them as his Nine
Old Men, which was a reference to Franklin D. Roosevelt's descrition
of the nine justices of the US Supreme Court at the time. The name
stuck

When Buena Vista Street opened in 2012, there were
several references to the early days of the Walt Disney Company. On
the right hand side of the street you can find the Atwater School of
Art and Animation. If you look at the sign out front you will see
that the instructors are Clark, Larson, Johnston, Thomas, Kimball,
Davis, Kahl, Lounsbery, and Reitherman. Who are they? You guessed
it! They are the last names of Walt Disney's very own Nine Old Men!